Father Augustus Tolton, on the way to sainthood

The church has saints because people need heroes. So says Oblate Father William Woestman, promoter of justice for the Archdiocese of Chicago’s Metropolitan Tribunal, who has worked on the causes of several saints over the course of his ministry.

When Cardinal George
returned from the ad
limina visit in Rome in
February, he brought back some
good news. The
Vatican Congregation
for the Causes
of Saints had
named Father Augustus
Tolton a
“servant of God.”

On April 14, 48 people made a pilgrimage to sites in Chicago where Father Augustus Tolton, servant of God, lived and worked. They took a step back to 1889 and visited the site of his first apartment in the city’s Bronzeville neighborhood. They visited the storefront site of St. Monica Church, the first black Catholic parish in the archdiocese. These are just a few of the sites visited during the pilgrimage sponsored by Auxiliary Bishop Joseph Perry’s office, the Office for Black Catholics and the Father Augustus Tolton Ministry Program at Catholic Theological Union.

Father Augustus Tolton was on the minds of many in November as the City of Chicago dedicated a street sign in his honor on Nov. 4 and the archdiocese held its first gala to raise funds for Tolton’s cause for canonization on Nov. 11.

On a warm, spring day in
Quincy, Ill., as sunset approached,
a group of bishops,
priests and laypeople gathered
in the old, tiny St. Peter
Cemetery, stood before a large
stone cross and prayed to the Lord
for his intercession in the cause of
canonization for Father Augustus
Tolton. The group was beginning
an overnight pilgrimage to the
significant sites in the life of a
man who was born a slave and
died a Catholic priest.

Father Augustus Tolton’s
road to sainthood took a formal
step forward Feb. 24
during the first session for canonization
held in St. James Chapel
in the Quigley Center, 835 N.
Rush St. Bishops, priests, religious
and lay faithful gathered for
midday prayer to witness the taking
of oaths by Cardinal George
and the commissions to carry out
their duties for the cause.

Everything is lined up to move forward on the canonization cause for Father Augustus Tolton. The guild and historical commission have been named. A local and Roman postulator selected. A website launched (see www.toltoncanonization.org). All that the archdiocese is waiting for to officially move forward is the nihil obstat from the Vatican naming Tolton a servant of God.

It was in the small St. Peter’s Church in Brush Creek, Mo., that a group of about 30 pilgrims felt the closest to Father Augustus Tolton, the first acknowledged black Catholic priest in the United States.

Father John Augustus Tolton was the first American priest of African descent and may one day be a saint from the Archdiocese of Chicago. At the beginning of March, Cardinal George announced that the archdiocese is introducing Father Augustus — also called Augustus — Tolton’s cause for canonization.